In this fleeting video report of the day, catch farewell close ups of over 20 Walt Disney Classics Collection characters!

Never have three dimensions captured Disney characters so accurately, as the Walt Disney Classics Collection. Even vintage maquettes animators used as guides, in the making of Walt Disney’s movies like “Fantasia” and “Pinocchio,” don’t seem to have literally stepped out of the film, in both form and color in the same way this fine art sculpture line does.

In 1993 at the start, original animators like Marc Davis were around too, with advice for translating their creations into porcelain. Collectors enjoyed how Tinker Bell’s sculpture precisely mirrored her on-screen pose in “Peter Pan.” And it wasn’t just fairies that received this careful treatment, even behemoths like Monstro were caught by the WDCC artists and sculptors. And we could own these ourselves!

Taking my framed art up from London a day early gave me the opportunity to un-box and experience close-up a couple of rare Disney “Fantasia” collectibles as you’ll see in this video:

I don’t think the initial Pixar characters were favorable to the line. Woody and Buzz look three dimensional already, and in 1998, better in life as… toys. Today though, the computer animated Disney character has the illustrative softness of those in a film Walt Disney himself had touched (films originally only ever chosen by the WDCC.) Elsa and Anna even look like fine porcelain.

New licensee Precious Moments in 2013 were about to put the WDCC name to Disney gift-ware. It was quite possibly the ire of collectors, that ensured the encasing of the Walt Disney Classics Collection line safely into a “vault” instead. After all, collectors had been educated on the finer points of porcelain figurines over the years by… the WDCC.

Snow White herself awoke from such a state and so one day I wish, will the Walt Disney Classics Collection. Could Olaf’s size and stature be more fitting for a starter sculpture? My first purchase was tiny Thumper. Once I had him home, larger “Bambi” pieces from that scene (with price tags I’d never once dreamed I’d pay) eventually followed. However, you and I can still open teal green boxes from the secondary market and in the meantime, here are a few, fun un-boxing videos:

Last year, I débuted a new style of my drawings. And over the next four Wednesdays I’ll be celebrating my “Where Pictures Shine” series of WDCC still-life studies. I feel this set of art, minimizing line and pinpointing color radiates a ‘precious gem’ quality.

The single agate blue on the collar of the sublime Lady from “Lady and the Tramp” shows how using one color, makes that same color almost spring out of the artwork at you. However for the Bespoke version, Buyers do have the option of requesting Lady’s license tag to be embellished with two pigments of ‘gold’ oil pastel. And I think a third color still stays within the simplicity of the style, and even suggest the option of some sparkling red copper oil pastel for Lady’s eye color.